National Visitor Use Monitoring Program Underway

Is that poll before or after the entry/use tax we now have to pay for what I thought we already owned for free?

The name of the agency is U.S. Forest Service, not "National".

This seems like another stoopid program of the Bush Administration, where the fee collection system is routinely ignored, where Forest uses that are exempt from the fee still have the paid vendors (who keep a share of the fees) try to collect the fee, and then have another private vendor try to collect personal date from taxpayers using their own public lands.

It all will be as successful as contractors to U.S. Department of Homeland Security asking anyone vaguely looking to be Mexican (whatever that looks like) about their immigration status, with a promise it only is for impartial data collection.

All not a valid sampling protocol and set up to attain the results desired ahead of time to justify a fee for using public lands.

The war in Iraq could pay for the entire Forest Service budget in a few days.

Since I stopped using Forest facilities when the use tax was imposed several years ago, the census-takers will be able to deftly sidestep my opinion.

As well as the opinions of everyone else who has done the same as I have, and stopped going to the Forest.

I used to camp and barbecue there all the time, and had no problem paying for a campsite. Camp overnight, pay for it...not a problem.

I will not, however, pay an extra tax in the form of an "Adventure Pass" (is that another case of smelling like a rose as long as the name is the same...despite being a skunk?) to park there for day use and enjoy what my taxes have already paid for.

We pay all these taxes, and yet we still don't have healthcare for everyone, the school system still squanders its money on pay for executives, then whines for more money, the roads don't get fixed, and people are still homeless.

I don't mind paying taxes, but I need to see a return for my money, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this.

As for our forests, I don't see where the double-dipping being done has created anything except resentful people who have stopped going altogether. $5.00 is a lot of money in these times, but that isn't the point. The point is double-taxation, and for something that doesn't cost all that much...unless one factors in all the paychecks for the Federal employees needed to collect and process the money.

Ugh!

"...complete with orange vest-donned surveyors with a list of simple questions."

This reminds me of those Santa Barbara "Hosts" a few years back that would troll the downtown area wearing pith-helmets ensuring an orderly experience for visitors and denizins alike. This is just another way for the government to control us.

So WHAT do we do about this ever-expanding waste of resources and time?